Martha, I've got something in my mind," said Mr. Binney. "It's been there for some time, but I haven't liked to mention it to you because I was afraid—well, I didn't know how you might take it. But really, you've taken what I have said in such a way as—as to be extremely gratifying to me, and upon my word I don't believe you'll think my idea so very absurd after all."
Mrs. Higginbotham looked at him with deep interest depicted in her face.
Mr. Binney squared himself and sat up in his chair. "Lucius is going to Cambridge in October," he said. "Now what do you say to my going with him?"
Mrs. Higginbotham's look of interest gradually brightened into one of delighted agreement. "Oh, Peter," she said, "if you only could! Isn't it too late?"
"Not a bit," said Mr. Binney. "There's no limit of age. I found that out long ago. I could go up there and be treated in all respects as if I was five-and-twenty years younger than I am. And do you know, Martha," added the little man confidentially, "such is my freshness of mind that I believe in time I should come to believe that I was five-and-twenty years younger."
Mrs. Higginbotham looked at him in speechless admiration. "It would be lovely," she said. "What an interest I should take in your doings, Peter!"
This speech was as a spark to the tinder of Mr. Binney's inclinations. "If you think about it like that, Martha, I'll do it," he cried delightedly. "And now I must be getting home. I'll have a talk to Lucius about it to-night, and come and tell you what I have decided to-morrow."
Mr. Binney took a tender farewell of Mrs. Higginbotham, and left her to spend the evening in roseate dreams of returning youth and a wider horizon than that visible from her windows in Woburn Square.
CHAPTER II
MR. BINNEY INTERVIEWS ONE TUTOR AND ENGAGES ANOTHER
Mr. Binney and his son sat over their wine that evening in the seclusion of the dining-room in Russell Square. Mr. Binney had been somewhat silent during dinner, thinking over the disclosure he was about to make. Somehow, now that it came to the point, he felt a certain diffidence in mentioning it. Lucius also had something to say, but waited until the servants were out of the room.
"I say, father," he said, when they were left alone, "I've ordered a new pair of patent leather boots from Peal's, and asked them to send the bill in to you."
Mr. Binney, immersed in his thoughts, had forgotten the occurrence of the afternoon, or he would not have rushed with such haste to his own destruction. "Bill into me, Lucius?" he exclaimed angrily. "What do you mean? You've got your own allowance, and a very handsome one it is. I'm not going to pay your bills for you besides. If it comes into me I shall tear it up."
"You've got your own boots," retorted Lucius, "and very handsome ones they are. If you take a fancy to mine I don't mind you wearing them a bit, only I haven't got enough for us both, so I thought you wouldn't mind my getting another pair, as I can't do without."
"H'm! Ah! yes!" said Mr. Binney, a trifle confused. "No, I don't mind really, my boy, though I don't think there are many fathers who would take it like that."
"There aren't many fathers who would take their sons' boots," said Lucius. "By the way, father, talking about allowances, what allowance are you going to make me at Cambridge?"
"Ah, Cambridge!" echoed Mr. Binney, as if that ancient seat of learning had just been brought to his notice for the first time. "Yes, we must talk about Cambridge."
"I should like to have it settled before I go back to Eton for my last half, if you don't mind," said Lucius. "A lot of my friends are going up, and we shall be sure to be talking over it a good deal. I should like to know what I shall be able to do and what I shan't."
"You ought to think yourself very lucky to be going to Cambridge at all," said Mr. Binney with a shake of the head. "I never had the chance of going to Cambridge when I was a young fellow."
"Oh, I daresay it's a jolly enough place," said Lucius, "although I shall be sorry to leave Eton. Still, it isn't all fun, you know, father. There's a certain amount of work to be done."
"Work! Of course there is," said Mr. Binney. "But what work! Think of being able to carry on your education till you're twenty-two or thereabouts. It's a grand thing, education. I never had any myself, at least not what you would call education, although I flatter myself I know as much as most people."
"Oh, yes, father," said Lucius. "Why, bless me, you've edited the text of Shakespeare."
"H'm, yes," said Mr. Binney, on whom a certain amount of adverse comment had bred a measure of distrust in this feat. He took a gulp of port. "We've always been friends, my boy, you and I, haven't we?" he continued rather nervously.
"Friends, father?" said Lucius. "Why, of course. I should think so."
"You might, perhaps, almost say that we are more like brothers than father and son," pursued Mr. Binney.
"I don't know that I should go quite so far as that," said Lucius. "But we always get on very well together, don't we?"
"Yes, that is what I meant," said Mr. Binney. "Now I've got an idea, which may be a little unusual." ("Not at all," murmured Lucius politely.) "But I hope you'll fall in with it. At least when I say, I hope, it doesn't matter a fig whether you do or not. I'm not going to be dictated to by my son, though he has been to a public school and I haven't. Who sent him there?"
"Why, you did, of course, father," said Lucius. "I don't want to dictate to you. What is your idea? That I shall go into the business when I come down from Cambridge?"
"That you'll do, of course," said Mr. Binney. "I hope you know on which side your bread's buttered, and who buttered it for you. No, my idea is about myself. I have worked very hard until now, but I haven't had the time for self-improvement that I should have liked. Now, what I propose to do is to take three years holiday off business and go up to Cambridge with you in October. What do you think of that?"
What Lucius thought of it might have been accurately gathered from the length of his face. All power of speech seemed to have left him. He could only sit with open mouth staring at his father, and this demeanour instantly set up the comb of that peppery little bantam.
"Well, well, what have you got to say? Why don't you speak?" he cried, with some heat.
Suddenly Lucius lay back in his chair, and gave vent to a loud, but entirely mirthless, peal of laughter. "That's a good joke, father," he said. "Gad! you are a ripper. Won't the fellows laugh when I tell 'em?"
This behaviour seemed to have a very ill effect on the circulation of Mr. Binney's blood, which flew into his head to such an extent that his face got as red as a tomato.
"What do you mean, sir?" he cried angrily. "It isn't a joke at all. Why should the fellows laugh, I should like to know? I tell you what it is, sir, you're ashamed of your father, you ungrateful young snob. Where would you have been, I should like to know, if I hadn't made my fortune and sacrificed myself to give you a good education? Sweeping a shop, I dare say, or a clerk on ten shillings a week. That's what you would have been, my fine fellow, and a
